Reuters South Africa – South Africa’s rand eased against the dollar on Monday, tracking a general weakness among commodity currencies triggered by a sell-off by hedge funds and may trend weakerduring the session, dealers said.<\/p>\n
The rand was softer at 7.2230 to the dollar at around 0655 GMT, 0.5 percent weaker than its close in New York on Friday of 7.1850.<\/p>\n
“The dollar has come back quite strong even after those horrible (U.S.) non-farm payroll figures (on Friday). We think it has got a lot to do with metals and all these hedge funds losing money on commodities,” one Johannesburg trader said.<\/p>\n
“I think you’ll see all the commodity currencies weaken a bit over the next couple of days on the back of that. It’s more related to funds doing bad than actual dollar strength,” he added.<\/p>\n
A recent fall in metal markets has renewed concerns that hedge funds making big bets on high prices may be in trouble, after a few funds went out of business last year.<\/p>\n
Copper and zinc took a hammering Friday on market jitters over reports that a hedge fund specialising in metals had suffered losses. Prices for the two major base metals have slumped as stockpiles grew after sales slowed to China, a key market.<\/p>\n
On Monday gold, from which South Africa draws a large chunk of its export earnings, bounced back on bargain hunting after falling more than 1 percent in New York but a firmer U.S. dollar weighed and investors awaited more direction from the currency market.<\/p>\n
Bullion was last trading at $647.20\/647.90 an ounce.<\/p>\n